Friday, September 20

Luke 6:43-45: Jesus said, “a tree is known by its fruit.” It is of extreme importance that we stress this point, because many Christians seem not to know about it. Jesus tells us to look for the fruit.

Some Christians imagine that they will be judged by their roots, not by their fruits. They pride and preen themselves that they belong to the true Church. They fancy that this is enough to be pleasing in God’s sight—simply because they have the proper spiritual ancestry. They look down on, and pass judgment on, other Christians that cannot boast that same spiritual ancestry.

To Christians such as these we say, with John the Baptist, “bear fruits worthy of repentance, and do not think to say to yourselves, ‘We have Abraham as our father.’ For I say to you that God is able from these stones to raise up children to Abraham” (Mt 2:9). We must not be deceived on this matter: No one has entered into everlasting life because he belonged to the true Church. That is to say, no one is in heaven because of his roots. Those who have entered into everlasting life have done so because of their fruits.

What shall we say to those who imagine that God will judge them by their roots? We will say, again with John the Baptist, “even now the ax is laid to the root of the trees. Therefore every tree which does not bear good fruit is cut down and thrown into the fire” (Mt 3:10).

These are the fruits that come from union with Christ. This is the union of which Jesus says, “By this My Father is glorified, that you bear much fruit; so you will be My disciples” (John 15:8).

The Apostle Paul describes this fruit: “for the fruit of the Spirit is in all goodness, righteousness, and truth.” A more ample list is available in Galatians 5: “the fruit of the Spirit is charity, joy, peace, longsuffering, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, self-control.”

Judges 15: To put the era of Samson into perspective, it is useful to consider him along with two other biblical characters, Samuel and Obed. According to Judges 13:1, Israel was in bondage to the Philistines for forty years, a bondage that ended at the Battle of Mizpah in 1 Samuel 7. In that chapter we learn that the Battle of Mizpah was twenty years after the Battle of Aphek, when the Philistines captured the Ark of the Covenant and briefly held it. It was right after the Battle of Aphek, we recall, that Eli died. These facts give us a basic chronology with which to work.

If Samson was born at the beginning of the Philistine enslavement, and if we put his marriage at about age twenty, then the marriage of Samson took place about the time of the Battle of Aphek and the death of Eli.

It was while Samuel was growing up, then, that Samson judged the tribe of Dan, and it was Samson’s weakening of the Philistines that prepared for Saul’s victory over them at the Battle of Mizpah in 1 Samuel 7.

Someone else born during the lifetime of Samson was Obed, the grandfather of David. Obed himself, we recall, was something of a “miracle baby,” in the sense that God used a special providence to arrange for his birth.

During the period of Samson, then, the Lord was already mightily at work to provide for Israel’s future. He did this by sending the world three special babies in rapid succession: Samson, Obed, and Samuel.

Saturday, September 21

Judges 16: Two facts, recorded in the first three verses of this chapter, prepare for the rest of the drama, in which Samson will be forced to fight to the death.

The first concerns Samson’s strength. Samson is unwilling to press the advantage he has by reason of his superior strength. He toys with the men of Gaza, but ultimately he simply leaves them alone. He will learn that the Philistines are not an enemy to be tolerated.

The second concerns Samson’s weakness, which is his addiction to the company of women. This weakness will lead finally to his downfall.

In all the previous judges we read that So-and-so judged Israel for X number of years, and then, after his death, Israel went a-whoring after false gods. In Samson’s case, however, we are told that he judged Israel for twenty years and then he went a-whoring. That is to say, Samson has become the symbol of Israel itself.

The men of Gaza presumed that they had Samson trapped. The city gates were locked, and they could deal with him in the morning. Samson not only opened the gates, he carried them a great distance, uphill all the way, leaving Gaza open to attack.

The time of Samson’s deliverance and exploit comes at midnight, a time that may remind us of Pharaoh, Moses, Egypt, and the Exodus. There is also a parallel with the opening of the Book of Joshua, where there was also an incident involving the city gates and the residence of a whore.

Samson has become careless in his declining years. He has begun to play with danger. He no long flees evil, as God would have us do. He teases his own soul, as it were, even as he teases Delilah and the Philistines. Every time he plays around, however, there is a lurking danger. His attackers are just out of sight, concealed in the inner room. He should remember the Lord’s warning to Cain with respect to temptation, “Sin lieth at the door.” Like Cain, Samson is within the reach of danger, but he continues to act unwisely, trusting too much in himself, as though his own memory no longer contains the record of his past failures. Samson acts blindly, even before the loss of his eyes.

In his whole relationship to Delilah, Samson was playing with death. The one thing Samson never did in his life was to flee. There is a proper time to flee, however. In the hour of temptation, flight is the proper path. Samson was blind, not recognizing the presence of temptation. He treated the whole thing as a game.

Sunday, September 17

2 Corinthians 2:3-37: Paul had hoped to meet Titus at Troas, to learn from Titus what had transpired in Corinth. Paul’s disappointment at failing to find Titus at Troas caused him, reluctantly, to abandon his ministry there and to sail over to Macedonia (verses 12-13). We readers find Paul’s distress understandable. Until he should meet Titus and learn what had transpired at Corinth, Paul would be distracted, uncertain how the congregation reacted to his “letter of tears.”

But why did Paul go over to Macedonia? This is not difficult to discover. If we think of him languishing at Troas for some days, perhaps even weeks, we imagine it would have been natural for him to sail over to Macedonia, from which, after all, Titus was expected. We should bear in mind that the currents and wind patterns between Troas and Macedonia made an eastward voyage longer and more difficult than a westward voyage. Because the Black Sea is normally colder than the Mediterranean Basin (on the average of ten degrees), the faster evaporation in the latter causes a strong southwest current to run through the Dardanelles, seriously influencing the speed of travel between Asia and Macedonia. A trip from Troas required only two days (Acts 16:11), whereas the reverse might take more than twice that long (20:6).

Paul proceeds to bless God for this fortunate outcome (verse 14), typical of the divine solicitude for man’s salvation. That is to say, in the recent difficulties at Corinth, the Lord had displayed the power of the Gospel itself (verses 15-17). For both Paul and the Corinthians the Gospel had become a matter of empirical evidence and concrete experience. God had “triumphed over” them (thriambevonti hemas–verse 14). This note touches the epistle’s major theme: God’s power made perfect in man’s weakness. Paul will speak incessantly of this “manifestation” (phaneroein–verse 14; 3:3; 4:10,11; 5:10,11 (bis); 7:12; 11:6).

Judges 17: The final five chapters of Judges form a sort of appendix, to show how bad things had become just prior to the rise of the monarchy. It was a period of great decline, and these stories serve to explain why Israel at last decided to want a king to rule over them. Israel’s lack of a king is mentioned five times in these five chapters.

Indeed, we perceive a decline even in the quality of the judges themselves. The list had started with the heights represented by Ehud, Deborah, and Gideon, declining gradually to the depths of Jephthah and Samson.

The present chapter begins an account of the failure of the Levites, on whose ministry the spiritual life of Israel depended so much. These were the spiritual guardians of the people. The apostate Levite introduced in this chapter was, in fact, a descendent of Moses!

We also see in this chapter the moral failure of a mother. When we began with the book with Deborah, “a mother in Israel,” we hardly expected things to end so badly.

If we compare this story with the Bible’s earlier idolatry of the Golden Calf, we see a decline from gold to silver. Even the idolatry is cheaper. Everything is declining!

The Levite described here is very typical of a certain kind of clergyman, who fails in his duties as a pastor because he finds it more profitable to become the domestic chaplain of a wealthy family. It happens all the time. We may contrast this Levite with the zealous Phineas.

Monday, September 23

Judges 18: The Danites migrated north to get away from the Philistines (verses 1-6). These men, we must understand, were quitters, unwilling to fight for their proper inheritance. They sought and accepted the counsel of a man that was not qualified to give counsel. They already knew what they were supposed to do, but they wanted a “second opinion.” The Lord had said, “Go, conquer the land that I will give you,” but they wanted an easy out, after finding that the task was more difficult than they supposed. Consequently they sought out a teacher who would tell them what they wanted to hear.

This should not surprise us, because we already know that this Levite’s own ministry has already been based on compromise and half-measures. He was not, after all, even authorized for the ministry he has undertaken. He is a false teacher, who pretends to speak for God.

The Bible is full of criticism against false teachers and false prophets. They are chiefly to be recognizes by certain traits:

First, they like to please people. They have no authority beyond their ability to please people. Their authority is based entirely on their popularity.

Second, because they want to please people, they tend to say what people expect and want them to say.

Third, if challenged they appeal to their success.

The situation was described by the Apostle Paul: “Preach the word! Be ready in season and out of season. Convince, rebuke, exhort, with all longsuffering and teaching. For the time will come when they will not endure sound doctrine, but according to their own desires, because they have itching ears, they will heap up for themselves teachers; and they will turn their ears away from the truth, and be turned aside to fables” (2 Timothy 4:2-4).

The Danites, who had insufficient courage to fight the Philistines, are quite prepared to invade a small defenseless people, who lived in an unwalled city (verses 7-21).

The Danites, that is to say, in addition to their other shortcomings, believed in cheap grace. They wanted the blessings of the covenant without the cost of the covenant.

Just as the Danites robbed somebody else’s land, they absconded with somebody else’s gods. Indeed, they wanted only such gods as they could control. Those were gods worthy of their cowardice.

They also discovered a clergyman who was worthy of them, a quisling that would do their bidding and tell them what they wanted to hear. This nameless man was a nobody, a clerical non-entity, a hierarchical cipher. Because the price was right, he went along with them.

Man-made gods, however, tend not to be very loyal to their makers. They are disposed to take on a life of their own. They declare their independence, as it were. Micah learned this the hard way.

The city of Dan became a center of idol-worship. Jeroboam I would eventually erect there one of his two golden calves.

Tuesday, September 24

2 Corinthians 4:1-18: The “abolishing” (katargeitai) of which Paul speaks here refers to the veil, not the Old Testament. This is clear in verse 16, where Paul refers to the removal of the veil from the heart (verse 15). No part of God’s Word is ever abolished or “out of date” (Matthew 5:17; Romans 3:31).

Contrasted with the veiled Israelites are the unveiled Christians, beholding and being transformed by the glory of the Lord (verse 18). Like Moses in God’s presence, their faces are uncovered, because there is freedom in the new covenant (verse 17). To Christians, then, it is given to share in the doxological transformation accorded to Moses, as they are transformed progressively into the image of Christ.

Paul’s comments are partly biographical, of course; he is implicitly remembering his own experience of conversion to Christ and the glory on the road to Damascus, the experience that led to his radical reassessment of the Torah. This is why he shifts to the “apostolic we” in the next verse (4:1). It is this “we” that proclaims the Lordship of Jesus (4:5). The apostolic preaching is the means by which others contemplate the revelation of God’s glory on the face of Christ (4:6).

For Paul the apostolic experience was like a sustained sense of being put to death, but not quite (verses 8-12). This sense of mortality, repeated in so many circumstances of Paul’s life and travels, is seen through the interpretive lens of the “dying” (nekrosis) of Jesus (verse 10). The death and resurrection of Jesus are the paradigm of power made perfect in weakness (cf. 1 Corinthians 1:25-31).

Paul’s preaching is based on that faith (verse 13). He understands what happens in his life through his deep communion with Christ (1:5; 13:4; Galatians 6:17; Philippians 3:10-11). This is the source of his “boldness.”

Judges 19: We come now to a horror story, a nightmare. There is a growing sense of darkness, beginning with physical darkness and going to moral darkness. The unfortunate woman is thrown out into the dark, where she is gang raped all night long. After enduring unspeakable brutality, she dies at daybreak.

There is a great irony, of course, in the fact that the Levite did not want to spend the night among pagans. He wanted to sleep secure, surrounded by his fellow Israelites. He lengthened his journey for this very purpose.

We must bear in mind that this is not a story about pagans. All the characters in this account are children of the covenant.

Gibeah, however, has become as bad as Sodom. Indeed, there are striking parallels between this story and that in Genesis 19.

There is also the cruelty of the Levite himself, who abandons his wife (for “concubine” in context means only a wife of inferior rank) to the cruelty of the mob. He has clearly not forgiven his wife for her infidelity. He is morally worse than she. This compromised individual is no man of God.

It is instructive that Hosea is the only prophet ever to mention this distressing incident at Gibeah, and he does so three times (5:8; 9:9; 10:9). Obviously Hosea, who also was married to an unfaithful wife, thought a great deal about this story and its potential lessons. Indeed, Hosea’s own treatment of his wife is a fruitful matter of contrast with the behavior of the Levite in this chapter.

Wednesday, September 25

2 Corinthians 5:1-11: At the beginning of this chapter Paul outlines a theme he will treat in more detail in Romans 8—the longing that the Holy Spirit prompts in the hearts of Christians with respect to the final glorification of their bodies (verse 5). Indeed, he speaks of this longing as a “groaning” (verses 2,4; Romans 8:23). It is death, not the body itself, that will be swallowed up in life. This longing is appropriate, because we are, even as we are weighed down by our mortality, the temples of the Holy Spirit, the guarantee and down payment of our final salvation.

Even our present union with Christ, moreover, does not eliminate the fact that in our mortal condition we are still separated from the Lord (verse 6). This is simply the difference between faith and sight (verse 7; 1 Corinthians 13:12).

This is a bold way to live. Twice Paul uses the verb “dare” (tharreo–verses 6,8), which takes up the “boldness” of the previous chapter. It is a courage given by the Holy Spirit, because few men would willingly part with their bodies to attain a better goal (Philippians 1:21-24). What is more important than either state, however, is to be pleasing to the Lord (verse 9), whether living or dying. This is what will count at the tribunal at which the value of our lives will be assessed (verse 10; Romans 2:16-26).

Meanwhile believers live by the first fruits of immortality that abide in their mortal flesh—namely, the Holy Spirit, by whose indwelling power their bodies will in the end be covered over in glory.

Psalms 82 (Greek & Latin 81): All our prayer is the fruit of the Exodus. That is to say, all our worship of God is rooted in our deliverance from demonic slavery by His gracious redemptive hand. It is “to the praise of the glory of His grace” (Eph. 1:6) that He has saved us. Of each of us, then, it is proper to say that God “unfettered his back from the burdens and took from his hands the basket of bondage.”

According to Exodus (2:23–25; 3:8–10; 4:31, etc.), our deliverance is itself God’s response to prayer. Likewise in this psalm the Lord says: “You called upon Me in distress, and I delivered you. I answered you from the eye of the storm.” These words, which resonate with the tempestuous scene in Exodus 19:18 and 20:18, are uniquely and perhaps more forcefully expressed in the original Hebrew: ’e‘nka bseter ra‘am—“I heard you in the hiding place of thunder.”

God then goes on to speak of His leading and feeding us in the desert of Sinai: “I tested you at the water of conflict. Listen, My people, and I will exhort you. O Israel, if only you would hearken to Me. You shall have no new god, nor shall you worship an alien god. For I am the Lord your God, who conducted you up from the land of Egypt. Open wide your mouth and I will fill it.”

Israel’s infidelity to the covenant during that lengthy desert wandering subsequent to her Exodus from Egypt remains the Bible’s perpetual admonition to the Church (cf. 1 Cor. 10:1–11; Heb. 3:12—4:2). Therefore this psalm contains both promise and warning for God’s people: “But My people heard not My voice, nor did Israel give heed to Me. So I dismissed them to their hearts’ desires; they shall walk in their own pursuits. If only My people would hear Me, and Israel would walk in My ways, I would humble their enemies at once, and take in hand their tormenters. The foes of the Lord will fawn before Him, and their doom will be eternal. But these folk has He fed with the finest of wheat, and with honey from the rock has He filled them.”

The sin to which we redeemed people are forever prone is that very idolatry from which the Lord has delivered us, that servitude to darkness from which “we have redemption through His blood, the forgiveness of sins” (Eph. 1:7). Those idols seem forever to call us back, even after we have turned away from them “to serve the living and true God” (1 Thess. 1:9).

Thursday, September 26

1 Chronicles 1:1-54: Chronicles treats the pre-monarchical part of human history is reduced to hardly more than an outline, or even a simple name list (Chapters 1-9). By leaving out all details of human history prior to Israel’s kingship, Chronicles conveys the impression that everything that happened before David was a preparation for the divine covenant with David. Indeed, in Chronicles, all the earlier covenants (with Noah, with Abraham, and even with Moses) appear diminished by comparison.

In First Chronicles the pre-monarchical part of human history (that is, prior to the reign of David, which began about 1000 B.C.) is reduced to hardly more than an outline, in some places simply a name list (Chapters 1—9). By leaving out the details of human history prior to David’s monarchy, the Chronicler conveys the impression that everything that happened prior to David was a preparation for the covenant that God made with David. Indeed, the real covenant of the Lord is that with David. In Chronicles all the earlier covenants (with Noah, with Abraham, and even with Moses) appear diminished by comparison. If the Chronicler would not regard the founding of the Northern Kingdom, the schismatic Kingdom of Israel, with so much as an explicit mention, it was because that kingdom was founded in opposition to the Davidic covenant.

Judges 21: The governing motif of this chapter is rebirth for the tribe of Benjamin.

It begins with a problem. The other Israelites have taken a vow not to let their daughters marry Benjaminites. This is the problem. No one had instructed them to make that vow, and now the vow has created a serious difficulty. They had taken the vow before they offered the sacrifice of reconciliation. They had acted with a split mind, doing things that were mutually opposed. This is an example of a rash vow, of the sort that Jephthe made. Such vows often enough create bigger problems than those they were supposed to solve. Anyway, this is the problem governing the present chapter, and the Israelites themselves caused it.

The story is full of irony, of course. For example, it ends at the shrine city of Shiloh, one of the ancient words for “peace.” The scene, however, is anything but peaceful.

How do we explain all this contradiction and activity at cross-purposes? The chapter’s final verse does the best it can for an explanation. Namely, everybody was following his own inclination and preference. “Everybody do what you want,” though a slogan not without popular appeal in our own times, is a formula for chaos, and what we have here toward the end of Judges is a chaotic situation.

Still, the Book of Judges finishes with an act of deliverance and a new birth. Benjamin is spared. It does not disappear from history, as did Simeon and Reuben. From the tribe of Benjamin, in fact, would come, in due course, the Apostle Paul. This final chapter, then, is about God’s fidelity even in the midst of irony and chaos.

Friday, September 27

1 Chronicles 2: Now we begin the genealogies of the “Israelites.” Indeed, we here observe, for the first time, that Chronicles habitually refers to Jacob by the name “Israel,” the name he received after his famous wrestling match at Peniel (verse 1). Whereas the name Jacob denotes that very interesting historical character to whom so many interesting things happened, the name Israel denotes more especially the patriarch of the twelve tribes, the man who gave his name to the twelve tribes.

In the genealogies of Chronicles, beginning with this chapter, we also observe that far greater prominence and elaboration are accorded the tribes of Judah and Levi, the kingly and priestly households. Taking Chronicles as a whole, Judah will get 102 verses and Levi 81 verses, whereas all the other tribes together will receive only 126 verses. For the Chronicler, writing long after the destruction of the Northern Kingdom by the Assyrians in 722 B.C., only Judah and Levi were of immediate moment, and he was very eager to demonstrate the support of the priestly tribe for the covenanted royal house of David. Hence, this dominance of Levi and Judah in his genealogies.

This chapter also provides the Bible’s only list of the Jerahmeelites (verses 25-41), David’s “country cousins” mentioned in 1 Samuel (27:10; 30:29). As usual, the Chronicler is interested in this family solely because of its relationship to David.

This pronounced accent on the genealogy of Judah will be of even more importance to the Christian, of course, because this is the genealogy of the Incarnation itself: “For it is evident that our Lord arose from Judah” (Hebrews 7:14).

Within the genealogy of Judah, special prominence is given to the ancestors of David’s father, Jesse (verses 10-12), for obvious reasons, and then to his descendants (verses 13-15). Here we learn that Jesse had seven sons, which is a problem if we recall that 1 Samuel (16:6-11) mentions eight sons of Jesse. Perhaps the rabbis were correct in their speculation that one of the eight sons, having died childless, is intentionally left out of this genealogy.

Because of Caleb’s prominence within the territory of Judah, a great deal of this chapter concerns his family (verses 18-24,42-50). There is, however, another reason given for this attention given to Caleb. It provides some background for the character of Bezaleel, who will be introduced in 2 Chronicles 1:5. This Bezaleel was of interest to the Chronicler, because he was the craftsman credited with the proper embellishment of the Tabernacle (Exodus 31:35-38). In this genealogy of Caleb, then, we see another sign of the Chronicler’s concern for all things associated with worship.

Since the word kenite means “smith,” we have in verses 50-55 the world’s first genealogy of . . . , well, “The Smith Family.”